


she donned her skin and swam away

by Qzil



Series: the ocean calls her home again [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Childbirth, Dubious Consent, F/M, Forced Marriage, Interspecies Relationship(s), Selkies, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-11
Updated: 2015-06-11
Packaged: 2018-04-03 23:50:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4119109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Qzil/pseuds/Qzil
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Meg sheds her seal skin to walk on land, Castiel hides it from her so she will stay with him and be his wife.</p>
            </blockquote>





	she donned her skin and swam away

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bendoverandbiteyourgag](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=bendoverandbiteyourgag).



It’s summer when he meets her.

The sun is blazing hot, turning the sand under his feet into fire, and the ocean is the calmest he’s ever seen it, the waves lazily tumbling toward shore. The gulls cry above him, circling in the sky, looking for whatever food they can.

He catches her shape out of the corner of his eye at first, and thinks that he must be mistaken, or else the sun has gotten to him. He goes through the logical explanations first: Dolphins far from home, a lone whale, a shark, or perhaps a piece of driftwood, or sunstroke, before he accepts the truth.

There is a seal moving through the water, moving toward him, in a place where seals should not be.

He watches the animal slither up onto the sand. It looks at him, dark eyes shining, and yawns widely, showing off its pointed teeth. He freezes, terrified and awed, and stares down at the animal’s sleek, spotted pelt. Its whiskers twitch, as if it is amused, before it flops onto its back and begins to wiggle.

The animal seems to shrink as a slit opens in its belly, but he sees no innards spill out, and no blood spills onto the hot sand. Instead, Castiel watches in amazement as a human hand emerges from the slit, followed by a foot. In another heartbeat he finds himself face to face with a woman pale as the moon, her face and body round with the signs of a woman who eats well, and her eyes as dark as the seal’s.

“Hello,” she says, heedless of her nudity or the blazing sand below her feet. She stares at him for a moment with unblinking eyes, before bending down to pick up the seal skin piled at her feet. Castiel notices her legs trembling and steps forward just in time to catch her as she falls.

“What are you?” he asks her. The woman ignores him and reaches around to pet his shirt, fingers moving slowly over the material. The fingers of her other hand stay fisted in the seal skin, her knuckles turning white from her grip on it.

She pulls back from him and tilts her head to the side, causing her long, dark hair to ripple around her head. “I’m a seal. Well, I’m a human female, now.”

“A woman,” he corrects automatically. She bares her teeth at him in what Castiel supposes is a smile, and he sees that they’re still pointed, still lethal.

“Wo-man,” she says slowly. “Oh.”

“What are you?” Castiel asks again. He glances at the skin and reaches for it, his fingers barely grazing the material before the woman snatches it to her chest and backs away warily. He lowers his arm and shrugs sheepishly. “Sorry.”

“I need it,” she says firmly. “I can’t go back without it.”

They stare at each other for a few minutes, until Castiel feels sweat running down his back. Finally, he sighs.

“Well,” he says. “You can’t walk around without clothes on. Not on land. Whatever you are, you’re shaped like a woman now. And it’s improper.”

She tilts her head at him again, eyes narrowed to slits. “Why?”

“Because humans don’t walk around naked.”

“Why?”

“Well, we just don’t,” he says firmly. She shrugs at him.

“Alright. Where can I find covering, then? Do humans also wear skins?”

“Sometimes. If you’d like, I could donate something to you.”

She turns and looks at the sea, drawing in a deep breath as she does, and stands perfectly still. “If you insist that I have to wear something. But you will not touch my other skin?”

He nods. “If you don’t want me to. Do you need help walking? My home is sort of far.”

She shakes her head, but slips her hand through his. He jerks at her touch, ice cold as the deep ocean, but her fingers only tighten their hold.

“Walk me.”

So he does.

.

“What is your name?” he asks her, politely keeping his back turned while she pulls one of his shirts over her head.

“Meg,” she tells him. “Do humans have names?”

“Of course we do. My name is Castiel.”

He hears a squeak and turns around to see her sitting on his bed, fingers running over the worn quilt that Sam’s wife had made for him years ago. His old shirt, faded to a dull yellow, falls past her thighs, the sleeves flopping over her fingers. He feels his heart skip at the image of her sitting in his bed, wearing nothing but his clothing, hair wild and untamed around her shoulders.

If she notices his look, Meg doesn’t tell him. Instead, she rubs her fingers over the worn linen. “That sounds silly.”

“I suppose to you it does.”

“My name means pearl,” she informs him. “Most of us have sea names. Those who were born there. My father was born here.”

“In this village?”

“On land,” she says casually. “I always wanted to see it. He talked of it so often.” She smiles at him, and bounces lightly on the bed. “Human dwellings are odd as well.”

“I imagine to you they are,” he says, and settles in the chair by his table, the only other pieces of furniture in his small, one-room shack at the edge of the sea. Her seal skin lays draped over the back of his second chair, the spotted pelt shiny in the light from the windows.

“Is everything made of wood?”

“Mostly, yes. Although there are also homes made of stone.”

She hums in acknowledgement of his words, then turns to look out the window. He’s always lived alone, ever since he moved away from his parent’s house, and had chosen the location of his shack specifically to be near the sea, so he can see it from his window in the morning.

Meg’s stomach rumbles. She jumps at the noise, and then absently pats her belly. “This form requires food. Shall we catch some?”

He opens his mouth to ask her what she means when Meg springs out of his bed and slithers bonelessly through the open window, leaving the curtains flapping. He runs to catch her and manages to see her plunging into the water, dark hair flying. Not willing to follow her out the window, he goes out the door and runs down to the shoreline, reaching it just in time to see Meg’s head break through the water, a large fish in her jaws. She smiles at him around the small body, pointed teeth digging into the scales, and spits it into her palm.

“Dinner,” she announces. “Although, being human, I suppose you have to cook it first.”

.

He builds a fire there on the beach and shows Meg how to gut the fish. She watches him with wide eyes, studying his every movement, and takes the cooked meat when he offers it. Her borrowed shirt, soaked from the sea, clings to her like the second skin, while her hair falls in tangles around her face and the light from the fire dances in her eyes, and Castiel swears he has never seen anything so beautiful.

“How long will you stay here?” he asks her as the sun sets and she looks out at the sea again. She shrugs, and throws the fish bones toward the waves.

“Not long. We can’t stay for long. But I wanted to see.”

“You could spend it with me, in my home, if you wanted,” he offers.

She looks at him, eyes tracing over his body, and smiles.

“Alright.”

.

For lack of anywhere else to sleep, Castiel tucks Meg into his bed and drags his extra quilts toward the fireplace, intent on sleeping before the hearth. Meg watches him as he does, unblinking eyes fixed on his form as he moves around.

“Why not sleep here with me?” she asks him. “There is enough room.”

“It is inappropriate,” he explains. Meg cocks her head at him and then slithers onto the floor to tuck herself next to him before the fireplace.

“We pile on top of each other, when we are on islands. There is no shame in it,” she tells him, laying her head on his chest. “Besides, you are very warm.”

He shivers at her touch, which is cold despite the fire and the blankets, but does not pull away. Her body is soft under his hands, and her hair as silky as the seal skin he’d dared to touch when she wasn’t looking. He can’t remember the last time he’d even been in bed with a woman, and he’s never shared a bed with someone who he wasn’t related to.

He relaxes against the floorboards and lets Meg stroke his chest, her head tucked under his chin, until he feels her hands wander lower. Yelping, he jumps away from her and scoots backward toward the wall. Meg looks at him with confusion written on her face and draws herself up onto her knees.

“Is something wrong?”

“You can’t do that!”

“Why not? You’re warm, and I like the way you look. I saw you looking at me earlier, too, before you had me wear this cloth.”

“It isn’t done. Not before marriage,” he tells her.

“I don’t know that word,” she tells him, sliding forward to trap him between her body and the wall.

“Two humans join together before God, and pledge to put aside all others for the remainder of their lives.” He knows he’s simplifying things, but he says them anyway.

“I don’t know who this God is, but I am not a human,” she says. “So human rules do not apply to this.”

Her kiss is soft, and salty, but he finds himself leaning into it, opening his mouth for her tongue. His old shirt is thin, worn nearly to holes in places, and it barely hides her flesh when he runs his hands up her sides to stroke her skin. Meg’s own hands explore endlessly, her fingers trailing over his neck and face.

“You’re so warm,” she breathes against his mouth as her fingers creep up under his sleep shirt. “Every part of you. And your skin is so strange. So dry.”

Her skin feels thick and almost rubbery, alien under his fingertips, but he returns her touches, anyway, fascinated by the texture. Meg makes small noises against his mouth and slides into his lap, legs splayed around his thighs, and moves her head to scrape her teeth against his throat. He can feel her smile against his skin so he decides to return the favor, nipping lightly along her neck to feel her shiver and make strange noises as his fingers graze the insides of her thighs.

“Mate with me,” she says. His stomach twists at her terminology but he slides his fingers between her legs anyway and finds her hot and wet. She rubs against him, insistent, and tosses her hair over her shoulders to look into his eyes. “It’s okay. Mate with me.”

The fire crackles behind them as he rucks his sleep shirt up past his thighs and pulls her shirt up, lightly tugging on her hips to encourage her to shift herself. She follows his hands, soft skin sliding against his palms, and lowers herself back down into his lap, gasping.

It’s quick, and mostly silent, Meg making breathy noises above him as he thrusts shallowly into her body and she tries to copy his movements, both of them unpracticed. Afterward, she presses her forehead against his chest and sighs happily. “That was so different.”

“You’ve done this before?” he asks her, absently threading his fingers through her hair. She nods against his chest.

“Yes. But never with a human. But I liked it well enough.” She sighs again, this time sleepily, and wraps her arms around him. “My knees hurt.”

“We should retire to the bed,” he suggests, trying to ignore her earlier comment. The only explanation is that she’s also mated with a seal, and he prefers not to think of it. Instead, he presses his nose against her hair and inhales. She smells like the sea and sex, and it makes him stir again. Meg giggles against his chest. It turns into a full blown laugh when he scoops her into his arms and rises, walking them toward the bed.

This time he moves slowly, lightly kissing his way from her neck to her chest, pausing to take each of her rosy nipples in his mouth before he moves his head lower. He tries to remember the things he’s heard Dean say over the years, but most of the well-meaning advice his sister’s husband has given him flies out of his head, replaced by the sound of Meg’s voice and the feel of her body under his.

She’s still wet between the legs, thanks to a mixture of his seed and her own arousal, and he laps it up with his tongue, moves until Meg tightens her thighs around his head and tugs at his hair, and knows he must be doing something right. He only moves his head away when she stiffens and then finally relaxes around him, legs falling limp over her shoulders. He lets her enjoy it for a moment, listening to her heavy breathing, before he moves back up her body to kiss her.

Her mouth is soft and salty, and her tongue warm, and he loses himself inside of her body again. He looks down and sees her staring back at him with eyes that are almost black in the light from the half-moon shining through the window, her lips pressed together as if she’s trying not to make a sound.

“More,” she demands. “I want you to keep moving.”

He obeys her, buries his head in her neck and runs his hands over her plump body as he takes her. He does not move away from her after, but settles his weight over her body and continues to breathe against her neck until she pushes him away. “That tickles.”

“I apologize.” She blows out a breath and turns onto her side, pulling the quilts over her as she does. Castiel follows her movements and pulls her back to him, possessive. “Will you stay here tomorrow as well?”

“I’ll stay until the moon wanes,” she says, voice heavy with sleep. “Once it is black again, I will return home.”

He tightens his hold on her.

.

As the days pass, he finds easy companionship with Meg. They swim together in the mornings, tend to the garden in the afternoons, and spend their nights together in bed. Meg seems endlessly fascinated with human food and human activities. Castiel watches her face light up with amazement at the chickens he keeps in the yard, and watches as she sinks her toes into the soil of his garden, delighting at the feeling. She learns to gut fish as quickly as he can, and rises even before he does in the mornings to feed the chickens and the pigs and hunt for fish for their breakfast. He watches as her skin goes from deathly pale to a healthy tanned color, warmed by the sun for the first time in her life.

At night they lay together, wearing nothing but their skins, and talk. Meg tells him stories of her life underwater, hunting with her pod and raising their young together. In return he tells her about his childhood on land, tells her about climbing trees with his brothers and sisters and combing through the forest and building his own home at the edge of the sea. He sheathes himself in her body between their talks, kisses her in the waning moonlight and listens to her laugh and sigh and moan under his hands.

He watches the moon drain away a little each night, until it is barely a sliver in the sky.

“The moon will be gone tomorrow,” she says casually. Meg sits up in bed and pulls back his curtain to stare at the sea. “I’ll go home.”

He stiffens behind her. “Must you?”

She nods. “Yes. I can feel the sea calling me. I have to go. Tomorrow, before sunrise.”

“Is that a rule?”

She shakes her head. “No. I just need to go home. It’s calling me.”

“Will you come back? To see me?”

She shakes her head again. “No. Once I put my skin on again and I am once again in my proper body, I cannot return for seven years.”

He feels his heart sink into his stomach. “You really have to stay away for that long? Is that a rule?”

“Not exactly. I don’t know what it is. But if I try to change again, it won’t work. I have to stay a seal for seven years, before I can take human form again.” She turns to him and smiles. “I enjoyed my time with you. You made it memorable.”

He forces himself to smile back at her and keeps his lips pressed together in order to resist asking her to stay. Instead, he waits until she falls asleep and slips out of bed to tip toe across the room. Her skin still lays draped across his other chair, and still feels as silky as always when he touches it.

He remembers her saying that she needs her skin to return to the sea.

Slipping back into bed, he makes a plan.

.

He feigns sleep when Meg slips out of bed to tend to the chickens, and rolls out of bed the moment he hears the door close behind her. Moving quietly, he crosses the room and kneels next to the fireplace, tools in hand. The floorboards are absurdly easy to pry up, and it only takes a few minutes to have a good sized hole between the stone and the wall.

He retrieves her skin and holds it in his hands, heart beating fast with the wrong he is about to do her. Then he folds it quickly and shoves it down the hole, mind made up. He cannot lose her, cannot let her go back to the sea. And without her skin, she can’t.

He replaces the floorboards perfectly, and goes outside to help her with the chickens and cook her breakfast. He watches as she pats each pig goodbye and feeds the chickens a little too much as her farewell present to them, and cooks their eggs in silence. They spend the afternoon swimming and playing on the beach, Meg bringing him small shells and shiny glass that’s been worn smooth from the ocean.

He follows her into the house when the sun sets and watches as she strips his shirt off and reaches for her skin. Her back goes taunt when she does not see it, and her eyes dart around the small space, searching. Castiel holds his breath until Meg’s shoulders slump and she turns to face him. He cannot quite read her face in the faint light from the fire.

“Husband,” she greets.

Castiel gathers her in his arms, heart soaring. “Wife.”

She does not return his embrace. Her arms hang at her sides, but she returns his kiss when he roughly presses his lips to hers and pulls her hips against him. That night she is not enthusiastic, and she is not playful. She does not even face him when he pushes himself inside her.

Instead, she turns and looks out at the sea. When he touches her face, he can feel her tears, and tells himself that, in time, it will be like it was.

.

She does not know how to be human, so he has to teach her.

He teaches her to sew and clean and cook, shows her how to light a fire in the hearth and goes for his sister to see her properly clothed. Anna’s eyebrows nearly hit her hairline when he tells her he’s acquired a wife, and even her children quiet and stare up at him with wide eyes, shocked. Dean laughs so hard he slaps his knee, and tells Anna that he will watch the children while she goes to meet her sister-in-law.

He tells Anna that he found her wandering on the beach, shipwrecked with no memory, and fell in love with her as soon as he saw her. Anna has never been a fool, and asks if he’s gotten her pregnant. He smiles and says he hopes he has. She shuts her mouth after that, shakes her head, and goes to fetch her sewing basket.

Meg stays silent as Anna measures and hems and haws and promises that she will take out one of her old dresses for the girl, and bring some cloth as well. Meg does not thank her, does not even look at her. Instead, she stares out his window at the sea, longing written on her face.

“She’s probably still shaken,” Anna tells him as he walks her home. “Give her time. She’ll come around. She did agree to stay with you, after all.”

.

“Must I wear this?” Meg asks him when Anna delivers her old dress. “It’s constricting.”

“Yes, you have to. It’s proper,” Castiel tells her.

She raises her eyebrows at him. “Why can’t I just wear your clothes? You have extras.”

“It isn’t done,” he explains patiently. “Women do not wear men’s clothing.”

“I did.”

“You did not have to live here, then. Please, Meg. You are my wife, and I would not have people say that I did not provide for you.”

She narrows her eyes at him, but pulls the dress over her head, anyway. His sister has always been an impressive seamstress, and Castiel admires the way the dress hugs Meg’s chest when the forest-green material settles over her body. She gives an experimental twirl, wrinkles her nose, and sits down on the bed.

“Humans are strange,” she says, turning to look out at the sea. “Besides, I am only your wife as long as my skin is gone. Once I find where you have hidden it, I will return, and this will be over.”

He feels his heart leap in his chest. “You know?”

She nods absently, but does not look at him. “Of course I know. That is the way it is done. My father warned me. If a human hides your skin, you must live with him or her as man and wife.”

“I thought you said you didn’t know what marriage was.”

She finally turns to look at him and sighs. “I lied. But you said you would not touch my skin, so you lied, too. So now we’re even.” Meg sits up and begins to climb out the window, still not seeing the need to use the door when a more convenient exit is in front of her. “The chickens need feeding.”

He watches her leave and walks over to the spot on the floor where he has hidden her skin, and wonders if she has been searching for it. He leaves the house and turns the corner to watch her feed the chickens. She looks like any other human girl tending to the homestead, a new, snow-white apron tied around her waist and the animals near her feet. Her dark hair flows down her back like a curtain, unbound because he lacks the materials to dress her properly, and her eyebrows are wrinkled in concentration as she scatters the feed.

“I’m going into town for a bit,” he calls. She waves her hand at him to say she’s heard, but does not respond.

.

He finds her a proper cap, sewing supplies, and clothespins, which are necessary. He also finds her a necklace made of wooden beads, an orange, and a pair of brass earrings, which are not. But he wants her to be happy, and to look pretty. He wants to show people that he can properly care for his new wife, and wants to see her smile at him once again, but this time he wants her smile to meet her eyes, like it had when they first met.

“What are these?” she asks, holding up the earrings. When he explains, she raises her eyebrows at him.

“Do humans often put metal through their ears?”

He nods. “I forgot, that yours were not pierced. I could do that for you, if you like. But it would hurt a bit.”

“If you want,” she says, handing the earrings back. “But it will not hurt.”

“I’ve been told it does.”

She looks at him with steady eyes, lips twitching in amusement. “Castiel. You have seen all of me.”

He stiffens. “I have.”

She lifts her dress up and shows off her side to him. He reaches out and traces the large, circular scar that he had never noticed before, having only seen her naked in the moonlight. She lowers her dress quickly and shoves his hands away. “Nothing can hurt more than that.”

“What did that?”

This time, she does smile. “Shark. I almost didn’t survive. I wouldn’t have, if I hadn’t shed my skin and crawled on land. I met a nice woman, a healer, and she helped me live. I was hunting with my pod, and I wasn’t fast enough to get out of the way when it came upon us. So, nothing you can do will be more painful than that.”

“I’m sorry.”

“One good thing about being here is that they can’t get you on land.”

Meg doesn’t wince when he puts the small earrings through her earlobes. She gingerly touches them and moves her head from side to side experimentally. In her dress and cap and baubles, she looks more like a human than ever.

That night she does not respond to his touches, but does not struggle, either. She spreads her legs and lies back like a woman doing her duty, and rolls away from him when it is over.

“We will be happy after a time, won’t we?” he asks her. “You will be as happy here as you were?”

She shrugs. “I don’t know. I will live as your wife for as long as I must, and I will do the duties expected of me. I will share your bed and tend your livestock and keep your house clean.”

“I love you,” he confesses.

“That’s wonderful for you,” she says tartly, turning her back to him. Her voice softens. “I loved you, too. But it isn’t right.”

“Meg, I want us to be happy. We were happy, that first week. Weren’t we?”

“I thought I was going back. It was supposed to be a fun trip. I should have listened to my father. He told me this would happen, if I mated with a human man. He told me they would want to keep me.”

“Then why did you do it?”

She finally turns to look at him. “I thought you were very pretty. I wanted you.”

“But not forever.”

She shakes her head. “I belong to the ocean. You belong here.”

He opens his mouth again, but she rolls away and settles down, pulling the quilt up to cover her naked body, and ends their conversation.

.

“Dean, I need to talk to you about something serious.”

Dean glances over at where the women are hanging up the washing and the children are playing. “Married life not all you thought it would be?”

Castiel shakes his head. “Well, yes. But that isn’t it. You have to promise you won’t laugh, or think me insane.”

“Alright,” Dean says soberly. “Lay it on me.”

He does. He tells Dean about finding Meg on the beach, and about hiding her seal skin under the floorboards near the fireplace, and how she plans to leave him once she can find it again. His friend’s eyes widen at the story, and he shakes his head and whistles once it’s over.

“You’re in trouble,” he tells Castiel.

“You believe me?”

“Of course I believe you. Look, Sam doesn’t know this, and neither does my dad, but mother had--she had someone else. Before my father.”

Castiel stares at Dean with wide eyes, and crosses himself. “She had a lover?”

Dean nods. “Before my father. She told me about him, when she was dying. She said that when she was a young girl, she met a seal that turned into a man with yellow eyes and sharp teeth. He spent several days with her, and then wrapped his seal skin around him and vanished into the sea again for seven years. When he returned, she had already married my dad and had Sam and I. She said…she said that he wanted to stay with her forever. But when he saw that she had married, he went back to the sea, and she never saw him again.”

“So it is true. They do need their skins to return.”

“Yeah, but you have her skin.”

“What if she finds it? Then she’ll leave.”

Dean hesitates, then glances over again to where Meg is helping Anna hang the laundry. Castiel watches as one of Anna’s children runs over and tugs at Meg’s skirt, raising his arms to be picked up. She swings the child into her arms, settles him on her hip, and reaches down to tickle his face, and Castiel feels longing grow in his chest. Dean must see it written on his face, because he reaches out and pats Castiel’s knee.

“I don’t agree with what you’re doing,” he tells him. “I won’t hide it here. You’ll have to find a better spot for it at your home.”

“She’ll tear the place apart looking for it. She’ll find it one day. Then she’ll leave.”

“Maybe you should let her,” Dean suggests. “If you’re keeping her here against her will, it’s not right.”

“She wanted to be with me,” Castiel argues. “She just…she can’t help it. Going back. It’s a compulsion for them.”

Dean sighs. “So, knock her up.”

“I’m trying.”

Before he can say anything else, Meg comes over, Dean’s son still in her arms. “Matthew wants his father.”

“Hey, buddy. Come here.” Dean takes the baby and walks away, bouncing him in his arms. “Oh, someone smells like they need a change. Is that why your auntie gave you to me? Is it?”

“Yes,” Meg deadpans. Dean chuckles and walks off with the baby. Meg watches him for a moment and then settles herself in Castiel’s lap, ignoring the empty chair. Castiel wraps his arms around her. “Do you want one of those?”

“Hmm?”

She angles her chin toward where Anna is talking with her daughter. “One of those.”

“Not one. Five or six.”

Meg turns to look at him with wide eyes. “Six?”

“I come from a large family.”

“I don’t. I have one brother, and I wish he didn’t exist sometimes.”

“So, you don’t want children?”

She shrugs. “Maybe one. Someday.”

He makes a small noise and lays his head on her shoulder, enjoying that Meg seems so relaxed around him now that they’re inland. Free of the sea’s influence, she almost seems perfectly happy, like any other new wife spending time with her husband. “Do you think we’ll have them? _Can_ you have them?”

“My kind and yours cross breed often,” she informs him. “Sometimes it works out well. Other times it doesn’t.”

“What do you mean?”

Meg shrugs again. “It depends. If you had a human parent, you have a better chance of carrying a cross baby to term. If you didn’t, it’s a fifty-fifty chance you’ll be able to carry a cross baby.”

“And your parents?”

“Were both like me.”

“You said your father was born here. On land.”

Meg nods. “My grandmother wanted to come up on land before she gave birth. She wanted some sort of human food. Apples, I think they were. Her skin was stolen by a young man who was in love with her, and she birthed her child on land. When she found her skin, she wrapped him in it instead of herself, so he could return to the sea without her. She knew her pod was near, and they would take him.”

“And your grandmother?”

“She had three human children. None of them could go to the sea, of course. She had no more skins to give.”

“Would you do that?”

“What?”

“To our child. Give him or her your skin, and send them to your pod.”

She shakes her head. “No. My father had a human woman as well, when he was very young, and he always remembered his life on land. He sheds his skin every seven years and walks among the humans for as long as he can. Sometimes he goes inland, away from the sea, so he cannot hear it call him. But he always has to come back. If his human woman had not married, he would not have.”

“Then you can resist the call of the sea?”

She shakes her head again. “No. We have to go back, as long as we have our skins. As long as we can find them, and don them, the sea will call us back.”

“Then how would he stay here forever?”

“I’m not going to tell you. I may be your wife, but some secrets are mine to keep. But I would not condemn anyone to the life my father lives.”

He allows her to have her secret, but hugs her tighter. “What do you mean?”

“I told you, he comes here every seven years, like clockwork. He resists the call of home for so long that, by the time he returns, he has forgotten how to hunt with his teeth, and he feels awkward in his real body. He feels compelled to return to land again and again. That is not the life any one of us should live. We can take human form, yes, but we are not human. We belong with our pods.”

He gestures to Dean and Anna and the children. “This is a sort of pod.”

Meg turns to look at him. “Yes. But it is not my pod. My father and brother and cousins and husband are my pod.”

He stiffens. “You have a husband?”

She shakes her head. “I misspoke. He was to be my husband, when I left.”

“Did you love him?”

“It doesn’t matter. I loved you, for a time, and I am here now.”

.

She takes him in a field on the way home, throws him onto his back among the flowers and climbs atop him as giggly and playful as the day they met. He tries to convince her to wait until they are back at the house, lest someone see, but she kisses him until his protests die in his throat and he gives in, kissing her hungrily.

“I don’t want to wait,” she tells him, lifting her dress. “Now. While I cannot feel the sea. While I am content with all I have.”

Meg, who has never made a sound during their lovemaking since he took her skin, gasps loudly as he enters her, head thrown back and eyes squeezed shut. He tries to shush her, lest someone hear them and find them there, but she shakes off his restricting hand grinds herself against him.

He takes advantage of her momentary loss of concentration and grabs her about the waist, flipping them over onto the grass. His wife laughs under him, skirts rucked up around her thighs. Her cap comes lose, spreading her long, dark hair into the greenery around them, and her eyes sparkle with happiness as she looks up at him and smiles.

He notices that her teeth are no longer pointed.

.

She returns to her old self as soon as they reach home. Suddenly quiet, she stares into the water and takes an unconscious step toward the beach.

“Did you know,” she says quietly, “that my kind have been known to drown themselves, trying to go back without their skin?”

He grips her arm to prevent her from going closer to the water. “You will not do that. You will not leave me, not like that.”

She shakes her head. “No. I would not do that. Not now, at least.”

“Has something changed?”

“Everything,” she answers. Meg pulls her arm from his grip and walks into the house without touching him again.

.

He spends his days watching her closely, making sure she does not find her skin or try to drown herself. But Meg never gives any outward signs of wanting to leave, just sits at the table and sews and sews and sews until Castiel is sure that they have enough small blankets and clothes for a small army.

“What are these for?” he asks her, holding one up. Meg raises her eyebrows at him.

“You have to ask?”

“Yes.”

“I’ve not had my human blood,” she explains. “They are for the child.”

His heart nearly stops in his chest. He sways on his feet for a moment before he falls to his knees, his whole body shaking. The child. Their child.

“How long?” he chokes out. “When did it happen?”

She shrugs, and returns to her sewing. “No way to tell. Most likely after we married.”

“What are we going to do?” he asks. “We can’t…a child, Meg.”

She doesn’t look up from her sewing. “I don’t care what you’re going to do. It isn’t in you. The thing is in me. I’m going to grow larger around the middle, and it will eventually come out. Then it will wear all these stupid clothes I’m making.” She wrinkles her nose down at her sewing and sighs. “Anna tells me that human young spend the first few years of life sleeping, crying, and throwing up on their mothers. And pooping. She’s pregnant again, too. She was very excited when I told her that I was. She wants our children to be friends.”

He swallows hard and glances around the small shack. “We’ll need some things.”

“There is plenty of time,” she says tartly. “You look like you’re about to vomit. Leave.”

.

Meg is the one who winds up vomiting later that day. He holds her hair back while she heaves, splashing the chicken under her. The bird squawks rudely and runs away, feathers ruffled. Castiel watches as his wife raises her middle finger at the bird and wonders who taught her such gestures.

She alternates between pushing him away from her and pulling him close to her, wanting him one moment and refusing to talk to him the next.

Through all of it, she looks out at the sea, a hand resting on her stomach.

.

Despite his careful attempts to watch her, Meg still rises before he does. He finds her on the beach one morning, barefoot and clothed only in her shift. She is still graceful despite the small bump on her stomach, and moves as if she’s dancing, each step fluid and precise.

He watches as she strolls along the beach, stopping every few moments to bend over and scoop something up. After a few minutes she turns and beckons for him to join her. So far out of town, he has no concerns about someone other than family chancing upon them, and leaves the house clad only in his nightshirt.

“Would you like to go for a swim?” she asks him. “It’s hot today.”

“I don’t swim very well,” he admits, embarrassed. Meg shakes her head and pulls her shift off.

“Well, I’m going in.”

He watches as she wades into the surf and then dives, moving as gracefully as a seal. She stays under for so long that he’s afraid she’s drowned herself in front of him, before he remembers that seals can hold their breath far longer than humans can. Despite her current form, he supposes that she’s kept some traits of her former body. She finally surfaces and walks toward him, water streaming from her body and small shells cradled in her hands.

She goes out each day and comes back with them, decorates is small shack with interesting looking pieces of driftwood and wind chimes made form seashells. He sits with her in the evenings and watches her carve strange symbols into the wood she finds while she hums to herself.

She has a gift for carving, he realizes later. She spends three days working on a piece of driftwood, carving seals into it so they swim around each other. On another day, she goes into the forest and returns with a sturdy branch, and sets about creating small, wooden toys in the shapes of seals, sharks, dolphins, and other fish. Another branch becomes a coral reef, but without the colors, and he wonders if she could make it come to life, if she had paint.

.

“Can you make a hammock?”

Castiel looks up from where he’s pulling weeds and frowns. “A what?”

“A hammock. A piece of cloth, or some ropes that are woven so you can sit on them, attached between two trees. Can you make one?”

He eyes her growing belly. “I can try. But should you be in one?”

“You can make it low to the ground. I need something that rocks.”

“Why?”

“Because I asked you to,” she says. “Can you do it, or not?”

He shrugs, and sets about trying to finagle one; finally coming up with what he thinks is a passable attempt. Meg simply brushes past him, settles herself on top of it, and reaches down to send the hammock swaying lightly. He watches as she closes her eyes, lets out a deep breath, and rests both hands on her belly.

He settles on the ground next to her. “Does this remind you of the ocean?”

“A little bit,” she tells him sleepily. “But also of a ship. I spent a short time on a ship, seven years ago. They hauled me up by accident. The men thought I was good luck, and invited me to stay with them for several days. I learned to fish traditionally with them, and they had this drink called beer, and one of them had a fiddle. I was made to dance with every member of the crew. When it was time for me to leave, I gave their captain a kiss for luck. I watched their ship for several days, after. They ran into no storms, and made land safely. Their ship rocked much like this, when it went through the waves. It was comforting.” She sighs and sets herself rocking again. “Those were happy days.”

“Are you not happy now?”

She presses her lips together. “I’m making the best of it. Isn’t that enough?”

.

With Dean’s help, he builds a cradle for the child. He has always had a fair hand for writing letters and drawing, so he attempts to translate it into the wood. It’s passable, he thinks, but nowhere near as good as his wife’s carving. He etches ocean scenes into the wood, anyway, carves two adult seals swimming around a smaller one at the cradle’s base. He adds fish and ocean plants and birds above them.

When he shows it to her, he expects praise, or a small smile. Instead, he sees tears welling in the corners of Meg’s eyes.

“You are not one of us,” she tells him quietly, fingers tracing the images.

“I’m trying,” he says, suddenly angry. “I’m trying, Meg.”

She fixes him with a cold stare. “I don’t care.”

“You’re my wife!”

“That does not mean I have to care for you.”

.

He talks to her carefully, after that. He does not touch her unless he has to, and notices that she shies away from even his necessary touches. Their conversations grind to a halt, with Meg barely speaking to him for days, and giving him the cold shoulder in bed. He does not even try to touch her while she is awake. He wraps his arms about her while she sleep and runs his hands over her belly, desperate to feel the child kicking.

He wakes one morning to find her gone. Exiting the house, he sees her standing in the ocean, loose hair flying around her face with the wind. The waves roll lightly up onto the shore, calm, while Meg stands waist-deep in the water, head raised toward the gulls circling in the sky. He wades out next to her and feels Meg take his hand to place it on her belly, and jumps when he feels the child kick.

“I know you’ve been feeling for it,” she explains. “There it is.”

“You should come inside. You’ll catch a cold,” he says, moving his hands over her stomach, anyway. The child kicks again at his touch.

“I won’t. The ocean would never harm me, and it won’t harm her. She likes it, I think. Swimming.”

“She? You think it’s a girl?”

She finally lowers her head and looks at him. “I know it is.”

“How?”

“They always are, when they have a human father.”

.

Soon her stomach is so swollen that she cannot do much. He has to put her shoes on for her, kneeling at her feet to lace them. He massages her ankles for her, and rubs her neck and back before bed. Anna donates more pillows for her to be comfortable at night, and visits often.

For the first time, Meg seems worried. “Anna says it will come soon,” she tells him as they settle down to bed. “It’s too early.”

“If we count back from before the wedding, it should be any day now. Right on schedule.”

“It’s too soon,” she frets. “It’s supposed to be a year. Will she be grown enough?”

“She will,” he says slowly. “Nothing will happen.”

“It may. Anna’s lost two already. They die so easily here.”

“As if they don’t in the ocean?”

Meg swallows hard. “It’s different. My people, we protect each other, and we protect the young. We aren’t like common seals. Here you have fever, milk rash, poxes…and the mothers die. I may die.”

“You won’t,” he tells her. “I promise.”

Meg ignores him. “Dying here. With my home right outside my window, without ever being able to go back. Dying on land like a goddamned _human.”_

“You won’t die,” he promises. “You can’t die. I’ll make sure that doesn’t happen.”

She smiles at him, then. “Empty words. You can’t stop it. But if I die, bury me at sea. Promise me, Castiel. After everything you’ve done to me, you have to promise me.”

“I will.”

She nods. “Good.”

.

Her water breaks in the middle of the afternoon as the sun shines down on them and the chickens are clucking at their mistress to be fed. Meg takes one look at the small puddle between her legs, shrugs, and continues working while Castiel insists she goes inside and rest.

“It isn’t coming yet,” she protests. “There’s hours to go.”

“Meg--”

She shoves at him, teetering dangerously at the shift in weight, and steadies herself against the fence post. “I’m fine.”

“You’re in labor,” he argues.

“Anna tells me that it takes a long time, and I barely feel any pain. Go fetch her. I’ll go to bed when she gets back.”

He takes one look at her, reluctant to leave her alone should the child come in his absence, but Meg’s glare sends him hurrying down the path. When he returns with Anna and the midwife in tow, he sees that Meg has already stripped the bed, changed into a nightgown, and tied her hair back. Anna and the midwife help her into bed, and then promptly boot him outside, telling him that he’ll be allowed back inside when it’s over.

He half expects Meg to ask for him to stay, to hold her hand and offer reassurance as their daughter slithers into the world. But she does not even glance at him as he’s ushered out the door. He spends the first hour sitting with his back against the side of the house, listening to occasional short screams and grunts of pain coming from Meg, before he resigns himself to the fact that it really will be hours before he knows if both she and the child will live or die.

He goes about finishing the rest of the chores, feeding the chickens and watering the pigs and cleaning their pen. When there are no more chores to do he returns to the door, staring at it as if he can look through the wood to see the scene inside.

It is nearly sunset when the door swings open. He falls forward, right into Anna’s arms, and staggers when he sees the blood on her. She holds him up and smiles.

“It’s alright,” she tells him. “Blood is normal.”

“Is she okay? I didn’t hear the baby cry!”

“She’s fine,” the midwife tells him, shouldering her way past the pair. Her face is hard, but her voice is soft. “Go meet your daughter, Cas.”

He stumbles into the house with Anna supporting him and sees Meg sitting up, quilts tucked around her, holding a bundle to her breast. Her hair is half undone, her face is covered in sweat, and there are dark circles under her eyes, but to him she has never looked more beautiful.

He settles on the bed next to her and does not even hear Anna’s quiet farewell or the sound of the door closing.

“All healthy?” he asks Meg, voice hoarse. “Ten fingers? Ten toes?”

“No fins, if that’s what you were worried about,” Meg replies. “But, yes. All ten fingers and all ten toes.” She peels back the blanket to let him see their daughter’s face.

He can find no trace of himself in the child, no evidence of his square jaw or cleft chin or strong nose. She has chubby baby cheeks and a small nose and a tuft of dark hair on her head. Even though he has Meg’s assurances, he reaches down and counts her fingers and toes himself, checks behind her ears and between her digits for any trace of fins or seal-like hair, and finds her perfectly human.

“Do you have a name in mind?” he asks her.

“I’ve named her already,” Meg informs him. “Morgan.”

“Morgan,” he breathes, reaching down to stroke the baby’s chubby cheek. “Does it mean something?”

She nods. “Dweller by the sea.”

“It’s fitting.”

She makes a small noise of agreement and yawns loudly. “I’m so tired.”

“I imagine. Let me take her. I’ll wake you when she needs feeding. I’ll fetch you something to eat, too.”

“Thank you.”

She gingerly hands him the bundle and settles down to sleep, not bothering to re-tie her nightgown. He sees a drop of milk dribble down her breast and leans forward to lick it away without thinking. Meg sighs happily when he does, and tucks the quilt around her.

Once he is sure that his wife is asleep, he turns toward the bundle in his arms. “Hello, Morgan. Welcome to the world.”

The baby’s eyes open and fix on his face, small lips open in surprise, but does not cry. He smiles down at her.

Her eyes are clear and blue like his.

.

Meg’s attention turns completely toward the baby, nursing her and changing her and singing to her, but Castiel finds that he does not mind. He tries to have as much one on one time with the baby as he can, but Meg monopolizes her, barely even allowing Anna and Dean and the child’s multitude of cousins to hold her before Meg snatches Morgan back. He spends hours sitting by her cradle, watching her sleep.

The only time Meg leaves him alone with his daughter, she returns with a nanny goat, and watches as he milks it. When he asks her why she bought it, she only shrugs and says that they will need the milk.

“I was thinking we might move inland,” he says casually one night as Meg eats her dinner and rocks the baby’s cradle with her foot to keep the child sleeping. “To be closer to Anna.”

She makes a noncommittal noise of agreement and does not look up from her food.

“I remember that you seemed happy there, away from the ocean,” he continues. “If this village does not suit us, we can go further inland. Dean’s brother, Sam, works as a carpenter an hour’s ride away. My parents live about a day’s travel from here. I’m sure they would love to meet their grandchild.”

“I will go where you go,” Meg tells him, still uninterested. “Morgan will always long for the sea, though. It is in her blood, as it is in mine.”

“We would be happier inland,” he argues. Meg shrugs.

“If you feel that way.”

.

Frustrated with her, Castiel leaves their home and spends the day with Dean. When he returns, he finds his wife naked under the quilts.

“Meg?”

She shushes him. “Don’t wake the baby. Come to bed.”

He sheds his clothes before he slides under the covers with her, but his questions die in his throat when Meg seals her mouth over his and her hands wander downward to stroke him.

“We shouldn’t,” he tells her. “Not with the child here. Not so soon after.”

“Anna tells me that we’ve waited long enough,” she whispers. “You say you love me. Show me that you love me.”

After going months without her touch, he is easy to convince. Meg’s hands are everywhere, roaming down his back and over his neck and scratching down his chest, as if desperate to memorize every inch of his skin. She willingly opens her legs for him, arches her back when he pushes into her body and keeps her eyes locked with his.

He holds her afterward, sated and happy, and buries his nose in her hair. She has not lost her sea scent, not even after all her time on land, but smells like more than that now. He can smell milk on her, and soap, and the sharp scent of firewood as well as the smell of salt and ocean.

“We will be happy,” she promises him, twining her fingers with his. “We will be very happy.”

“I love you,” he tells her.

“I love you, too. Now sleep. Everything will be better in the morning, for both of us.”

.

She is gone when he wakes, like she usually is. Castiel dozes in bed for a few more moments, enjoying the cool breeze rolling through the room, before Morgan’s shrill cry awakens him. Only then does he freeze and jump out of bed.

Meg never leaves Morgan behind while she goes out in the morning.

Frantic, Castiel picks his child up from her cradle and pokes his thumb into her mouth, wincing when Morgan’s gums clamp down on the offered digit. He glances around the small shack and feels his heart sink deep into his stomach when he sees the pile of wood next to the fireplace.

Sinking to his knees, he plunges his arm into the hiding place, searching for Meg’s seal skin, and finds her necklace of wooden beads and her earrings in its place. When he runs outside, he can just see a lone seal sitting on the beach, head tilted toward the shack. It spots him before he can call, twitches its whiskers in farewell, and then turns to lumber back into the water. Morgan begins to cry in his arms, hungry for milk, and Castiel realizes why Meg bought the goat.

He stands on the beach for a long time, drowning out his child’s cries, before he turns to walk toward the back of the house to feed his daughter.


End file.
